Sleep Dream Wake Live LOVE: Bakemono no hanabira
by Winter Ashby
Summary: Sleep Dream Wake Live sequel. 'He'd purr under the caresses of her gentle touch and thanked god for pink, green, red and pale skin. And each day she woke to red, pale green, black rimmed eyes and grainy sand in her bed and in her heart.' [Gaara & Sakura]


**Title:** Love 'Bakemono no hanabira'  
**Author: **Winter Ashby _(rosweldrmr)_  
**Disclaimer: **I don't own Naruto and I am in NO way affiliated with Masashi Kishimoto-sama. Useless wishes wasted away one a fruitless cause...  
** Rating: **T  
** Summary: **(Sleep Dream Wake Love) sequel. 'He'd purr under the caresses of her gentle touch and thanked god for pink, green, red and pale skin. And each day she woke to red, pale green, black rimmed eyes and grainy sand in her bed and in her heart.'  
**Authors Notes:**  
Well, hello again. I'm finally done with the whole Sleep Dream Wake Live and now **Love **series. I will not be doing anymore of this.

Any who, this is dedicated to all my fans who have read and reveiwed... you are so kind to me and I hope this is a fitting end to my little saga. Just as a little sidenote, _Bakemono no hanabira_ means someting along the lines of _The Monster's Flowerpetal_. Now I don't speak Japanese, but I've tried my best to get the idea right. You all get the idea, right? Good!**  
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The leaves fall and the seasons change, but his hand in hers was as constant as the rising moon each night. So she woke each day with a little less pain because the presence of the man beside her quieted her heart. His monster faded until it was only a distant memory of a life that someone else had lived, because his flower was precious and he knew with utter certainty that he would sacrifice everything he was to protect her. In their world of little words and a passion so great it shook them to the core they lived like king and queen of their shared world. 

Time came and went and the fairytale that they created became legend in Konoha and Suna. Villagers told the story of the monster who became a king and gave up his kingdom to protect a wounded flower petal that was carried away from the other leaves on the strong wind. Bakemono no hanabira was carved into the door frame of her home and engrained in every inch of her soul, because it was their story. She was his flower petal, and he was her monster. So their world spun around and time tickled on as their love grew and ballooned until she was sure she'd always loved him.

He watched, with unbridled amusement as she'd smile just for him and she giggled when she caught him reading her cook books covered in flour. She watched him slowly until his frowns became less and less until they were so intermittent that they were just an expression, instead of his face. He curled around her body in the dead of night and buried his face in her perfect hair because deep down, pink wasn't so bad. He'd purr under the caresses of her gentle touch and thanked god for pink, green, red and pale skin. And each day she woke to red, pale green, black-rimmed eyes and grainy sand in her bed and in her heart.

In the wake of his new humanity, he was wholly devoted to the task of protecting her. He lived by her side and watched her every movement. She felt him over her shoulder on missions or when she was at the hospital. Even though she was strong and proud she allowed him the one simple act of constant attentiveness because in her heart she longed for him too, because she would never be whole without him by her side.

Eventually brown infiltrated their world and swirled with pink until she was sure one couldn't exist without the other. And she worshiped him because he was the Kage of her world and he gladly ruled over the empire of her bedroom. He protected his precious nation of one with all the power that remained in his singular body and learned to harness the chakras that mixed in him. He was no longer a kingdom-less Kage and she was whole in the confines of his arms.

She slept and dreamt and woke this morning with a former Kage in her bed and the memory of a lost friend that tied her to him. So she closed her eyes and rolled into him because he was hers. She looked past the cresting rays of sun that filled her eyes to the red hair that sprawled out on the white pillow case. It had grown much longer in the years that passed, and she wrinkled her nose at the thought of him at 13 with the short spikes. She enjoyed the hanging bangs that almost covered his black-rimmed eyes. She could see the rise and fall of his chest and smiled as she closed her eyes and twisted her body around his familiar form, enjoying the feel of his skin against hers.

He woke to soft pink tresses under his chin and a strange expression crossed his face in the rising sunlight. Gaara smiled. But it lacked the maniacal glint that all other previous smiles in his life had, because he was no longer the same. So he let the sweeping joy spread through his mortal body for the woman wrapped in his arms and living deep in his heart. He leaned down and kissed her forehead. He savored the lingering taste of her soft skin on his lips and felt her face shift into a beautiful smile against the bare skin of his chest. He didn't have to look to know that she was smiling, so he closed his eyes and saw it in his mind.

"Gaara?" her breath against his skin made his heart speed up and he desperately reminded himself of how fragile she was. Not for the first time the mysterious will power to hold back was almost painful. He thought he might die if he didn't have her, but knew that she was a drug he would never be able to quit. He was addicted to her, to her skin and hair and eyes and love.

"Hm?" he mumbled from his perch of tentative self control and hated himself because he knew that all he wanted to do was roll her over and lay with every inch of his body pressed against hers. He wanted every piece of her to match with him and make them part of the world as one, connected entity.

"It'll be three years." She commented, knowing she didn't have to say anything else. Instead she let the passing memories of sleeping, dreaming, waking, and living float through her mind and grazes over her heart. She thought idly that it reminded her of beginnings and endings, a bittersweet life and an unexpected companion.

"Ah." He replied and pulled her close and drank her in because she was his and he liked it. And the former Kage did what pleased him. But she didn't need to tell him how it had been since he woke for the first time with nothing but the thought of flower petals and deep pain pulling him out and away from who he was. Sometimes he though the icy feeling in his heart could have been homesickness or even frustration for his weakness. But then he looked into her eyes and felt the pain fade away. "Sakura?"

"Hm?" she responded from her throat and smiled at her own imitation of him. And she waited for him to speaking, knowing from the tone in his voice that he would take his time. It felt like the years they'd been together were passing in between them as his voice and her mind rested in the comfortable silence of her room.

"Eya." He shook his head against the crown on her silken hair and reverted back into the thoughts that filled his mind. Even in the morning light, he was reminded of three years gone by and the night he found her broken. He held her closer then, because he would never allow her to break again. She sighed, because she knew there was more that swirled beneath the solemn depths of his eyes but she let it be.

"You know…" her voice filtered through the sunlight and twisted playfully around his mind. "…you never answered my question that night." Her slender finger found its way to wind along the length of his exposed side. There was an impish tone in her sweet voice as he pulled memories from deep in their shinning past.

"Oh, and what questions was that?" he didn't need her to tell him, each moment of that night was seared into his mind like a brand of absolute dependency. That was the night they were mended in each other's arms for the first time, when he returned to protect her and she held his hand and heart in the rising sun. It was the night he carried her away and knew for all certainty that he loved her.

She smiled, because he knew full well what question she was talking about. The one he never bothered to answer before he carried her away and made love to her for the first time. She tilted her head up and back so she could see his face in the daylight. "How long will you stay?" Her voice was small next to him, it reminded him of when he'd first found her. It was timid and betrayed all the ridiculous courage he knew she possessed. He smiled then, one of his own, distinct, and more frequently occurring smiles that made her heart clench around her love for him.

"Come with me to Suna." Her eyes went wide as she contemplated his delicious ability to change to subject. But his request was still shocking all the same. He'd only been back to his home once in the three years they'd been together, and that was because Tsunade had given her a mission there and he'd followed.

"What?" Her face fell as she recalled the haunted look in his eyes as the mission ended and they traveled slowly through the sand back to the forest. He never referred to it as home, but she heard it nonetheless, on the edges of his words and in the corners of his eyes – she felt it in his heart. He missed his home. But she'd never been able to bring it up. Because every time she thought about it her heart was struck with a pang of guilt. It was her who kept him from his home.

"I wish to return for a while." He felt her tense in his arms and waited for a response. He was sure there was a raging battle of guilt and duty that swirled in her heart, because he knew his dainty flower petal. He knew she blamed herself for his departure from Suna, and that's why he knew that she'd allow him to take her away, yet again, to his former land of sand and sun.

"Soca." His simple answer was enough to move her fractured heart until it formed around the memory of sand between her toes and under her clothes. She smiled in the confines of her mind and thought she'd never considered sand to be so comforting before he'd pulled her from the brink of oblivion.

"So, you will come?" his voice was light, like a gentle breeze that passed over her heart in the new morning and the distant memory of what brought him to her. She still thought of her departed fox often, but slowly the gripping existence of fault was beginning to chip away and fall back into a past that she knew she couldn't change. He needn't ask if she would follow him, her monster that learned to be human in her arms. She would always follow him, and she knew then that without his hand in hers, she would shatter.

"Hai…" he gave an approving little nod and she giggled into his chest. She was secretly glad he'd finally outgrown her. Even if it was only by an inch or two, their bodies matched perfectly in her huge bed as she held him with all the love that overflowed for her reformed monster. "…but you still didn't answer my question." His wistful smile faded just a fraction. He should have known that he couldn't escape it. "How long will you stay with me?"

He twisted her slightly in his arms and looked down at her with a gentle warning. "Stupid girl, don't make me answer that." They both knew full well what the answer to that was, but the last remaining shreds of his dignity urged him to let those words remain implicit. He was a former kage, graceful and elegant to the last. He begged her silently to let this pass, like she had done in the past.

"Onegai, _Gaara_…" it seems that she would no longer be satisfied with the unspoken agreement, and he smiled a sad, little broken smile because she was so powerful that her supplications could bring him to the brink of absolute surrender. He sighed and closed his eyes and wished that he could cross his arms over his chest because at least if he could perform _his_ gesture while admitting unconditional defeat, he could hold on to the last tendrils of his pride.

She smiled for him because she knew he could see it behind his closed eyes as he finally gave in to her gentle prodding. This, after all, was not the first conversation of this type. But it seemed that this morning, he was finally ready to admit to all the implications that lay just below the surface for them. "I will stay by your side as long as there is a place for me." He spoke with his eyes closed and suppressed the smirk as he felt her sigh into his chest.

"Yocata." She felt her heart swell and flicker for all the promises still left unsaid but she could hear churning just beneath the fragments of his words. She could hear 'forever' echo through the vast infinity of their world as she settled farther into his embrace. Yes, he was hers and she was him. And all that existed was him and her and a bed, their bed – their world.

"Sakura…" she looked up then, at the tint of roguish glee shown behind his eyes. She tilted her head a little and waited for him to continue. "How should we celebrate?" he wore a wicked grin as her eyes met his in the wake of the mischievous tone in his voice. He pulled her close and savored her lips because it was real and she was so soft and warm he thought he might cry all over again. He tasted her because she let him and loved her because she was him. So he slid the shirt from her skin and thanked god for every inch of her. And she loved the look in his eyes as she stood bare for him to see. He watched her with his human eyes and loved her with his human heart because he touched her with his human hands and tasted her with his human lips.

So it was that the monster who was empty was filled with a new human proclivity for love and the flower petal that was stained with phantom blood was cleansed by the presence of the monster-less man. He was mortal and she was eternal for his empty soul that drank her in and soaked her up. So she crawled into him and twisted her soul until they were entwined to deeply she couldn't exist without him. And the world passed away and all that was left was her and him and a bed. So they slept and dreamt and woke and lived because they loved.

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I have many more ideas in the works, including a series of **DBZ **vignettes, a brand spanking new **Sakura/Kakashi** fic that is so close to being done I can almost taste it! But they are both a little more mature than is allowed to post on this site so they will be up on my media miner account. Please, I implore you to check out my profile and check for updates because that has all my links and a lot of cool stuff. I've just finished a **fanart **for InuYasha that's a seudo-coverart for Resmiranda's Tales From the House of the Moon. It's the most amazing Sesshoumaru/Kagome fic ever written, check it out!

Okay, that's the end of the this little shameless plug. I welcome stalkers and lurkers of all kinds. I would love to have everyone who's reading this to visit my profile and stalk away. Also, for all you Sakura and Gaara fans, I'm a member of a community at Deviantart, the link is on my profile, for these two.

-Ash


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